


And so pass all things

by victoriousscarf



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: M/M, Master/Padawan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-14 22:45:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5761774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/victoriousscarf/pseuds/victoriousscarf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ulmo never wanted one padawan let alone two.</p><p>He never meant for so many ties of attachment to link them together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And so pass all things

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kaleidomusings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaleidomusings/gifts).



> Kaleidomusings popped up on tumblr one night going you should write a Silm/Star Wars au! And I instantly went oh no no Beware of Heroes is quote enough of a Silm Sci fi au for me. Followed promptly by but if I did it would look like this.
> 
> While I'm still convincing her to write the Fingon/Maedhros plot I roped off the Finrod Ulmo corner for myself.
> 
> Set sometime in the Old Republic era ie before Darth Bane and the rule of two.

Even in times of war, it was considered improper for a Jedi to have more than one padawan.

And to be perfectly honest if the council had it's way, Ulmo would be the last master to hand two impressionable boys too.

But when the smoke cleared after the Sith attack and their eventual rescue both the boys had bonded too tightly to him, and despite everyone's protest, including Ulmo's own, they refused to be parted from him.

“Exactly who else are we to have as master?” Finrod asked, his eyes defiant and his hair shining in the light from the high sun. Even still as a boy sometimes it hurt to look at him too closely. 

“There are no other masters,” Turgon said, dark haired and serious to Finrod's fast moving mouth and hands. “We would be too old to be chosen as anyone's padawan by the time another master appeared for us.”

Manwë narrowed his eyes at all of them, and Oromë folded his arms over his chest, mouth twisted unhappily. “They are right,” Varda said, her hands folded into the sleeves of her robe and her silver gaze serene. “We have too many children and no one to train them.”

“But,” Ulmo said, standing in the middle of the council with the two boys in front of him. He could feel already the strands of a bond between them in the Force and if it was not squashed now, it would only continue to grow. 

He had never wanted a padawan, let alone two. 

But when Finrod turned his head slightly, looking back at him with hurt eyes and when Yavanna whispered about the power of the Force to push people on the right path, Ulmo already knew it was a lost battle.

-0-

Turgon was the taller of the two boys and remained so the entire time, but when Finrod grew it was abruptly and he went up in leaps and bounds and then seemed like maybe he had stopped growing until he shot up again. 

Constantly replacing clothes that were outgrown was just one of the reasons Ulmo had never wanted padawans. 

Turgon grew steadily, constantly, like a tree, and it allowed one to get constantly used to his new shape, the lengthening of his form and his sharper adult features. With Finrod, Ulmo turned around and it was a shock to see someone else there, shaped enough like his padawan to know it was him. 

“Master, you're staring again,” Turgon said, a quiet reminder at his elbow. Ulmo made a sound and forced his eyes to roam around the room at large instead of focusing so steadily on Finrod who was distracting it seemed like half the ball room with his smile and laughter. 

Ulmo had never liked diplomatic missions to begin with. Even though each world they convinced to stay with the Republic, to fight against the Sith was a great win for all of them. 

Too much of him wanted to drag Finrod from the room and away from all those prying eyes. 

At least by his side, Turgon seemed to find some of it distasteful as well. He was a quiet and steady boy compared to Finrod who flitted from one side of the room to the next, constantly in motion and talking, attracted to bright things and vain with his own appearance. And yet somehow they still remained the closest of friends, and some mornings Ulmo would look in on their rooms to find them sleeping in a huddle in the middle of the floor instead of their own beds.

Ulmo had haltingly tried to talk to them about attachment then and Finrod had still only smiled and asked if they were not supposed to care about their fellows, their fellows in arms and peace. 

Ulmo bit his tongue on saying he was worried their attachment might be something else. 

Except no matter how often he watched, he never caught a hint of something else, either through them or the Force that it might be something else. Finrod would hang off Turgon's shoulders and Turgon would shake his head but smile, and they would easily sway into each other's space. But there were no heated gazes, no touches that were too intimate, no desire seeping it's way into the space between them.

Later Ulmo would realize Turgon had been watching him and Finrod in the same way, and that he had found something more disturbing than Ulmo had.

-0-

They were ready for their Trials at different times, Finrod having crossed that last boundary sooner than Turgon who was still steady and calm behind him. 

They would make a shocking team, Ulmo thought again, when Turgon caught up again.

“I am going to recommend you for your Trials,” Ulmo said, catching Finrod perched on the balcony of their quarters in the temple. 

For a moment Finrod didn't look at him. “But not Turgon.”

“He is a few months behind you yet,” Ulmo said. “But soon enough I will recommend him too.”

Finrod turned his eyes back out into the brightly lit night sky. “You do not want other padawans after this,” he said.

“No,” Ulmo said, his hands tensing and relaxing by his sides. 

“Even after all this time with us?” Finrod said and there was something hiding under the tone of his voice Ulmo could not quite parse out. 

“You have both been good padawans,” Ulmo said, even though some nights he did not sleep, staring at their sleeping forms, worry and fear beating under his breastbone all the while. They lived in uncertain times and while his gift of foresight might have been the only one among the Jedi greater than Finrod's own, it still told him nothing about their fates. 

Worrying about their safety made him want to throw up and he did not wish to go through this again. Constantly he meditated at night, trying to ease the threads of attachment out of his heart. And the next morning all it took was Finrod's smile and Turgon's first wry remark of the day for it all to fall apart. 

Finrod kept looking out at the sky and he was beautiful enough now that it made Ulmo stop breathing. 

“Something dark is coming,” he said and Ulmo stared at him. 

“I have not felt it,” he said. “No more than the war that continues.” 

“No,” Finrod said quietly and Ulmo felt a great unease shift in the air around him. “No, it is something worse than that.” He finally turned back to Ulmo and there was such desolation in his eyes Ulmo had to step forward. Too close, his mind told him frantically. He was too close now. 

But when Finrod reached out, he did not draw back. “I will become a Jedi,” Finrod said. “But I will not be one for long.”

“Yes you will,” Ulmo said because any other consideration was too much. “You will be a fine Jedi, Finrod.”

“Yes, Master Ulmo,” Finrod said but there was something mocking in his eyes. He reached forward and Ulmo was still just too close. His fingers curled around the back of Ulmo's neck and he drew him forward, Ulmo unresistant until Finrod's mouth covered his in a whisper soft kiss. 

“Don't,” he said and Finrod pulled back, meeting his eyes. “You are my padawan. I am,” and his voice broke on the next words, “your Master.”

“Yes,” Finrod agreed and his eyes fluttered shut. He leaned forward and Ulmo almost flinched back. But Finrod just pressed an open mouthed kiss to his temple and held it there a moment too long before drawing back. 

Ulmo did not open his eyes. “I still am recommending you to the council tomorrow.”

“I know,” Finrod said and Ulmo left him there before he did anything foolish. 

-0-

Weeks later, when there was a hole in his life the size of both padawans he wished he had done something. Tried to tell Finrod one more time the future was always in motion, that no darkness had to come to pass. That maybe he had kissed Finrod back like he could admit to himself he wanted to. 

Instead the whole order had watched as not just one Jedi defected but an entire faction of the order slid off into darkness, lead by Feanor's blazing light. They didn't quite go all at once but they might as well have considering the speed in which they fell, like dominoes to some dark fate. 

He did not see Finrod for a very long time. 

-0-

Ulmo was quite convinced he was too old for this when he woke up, with every joint and bone in his body aching. It was to be honest how he felt every morning, waking up in his empty quarters. 

But it was worse because now he was laying on stone with his head throbbing. 

“You should not have come looking,” he heard and he would still know that voice anywhere. 

“You were my padawan,” he said, not opening his eyes. 

“That does not mean you are guilty of any of my sins,” Finrod said and when Ulmo finally opened his eyes, Finrod was seated beside him, his hands folded under his chin on the edge of the rock where Ulmo lay. “That does not mean we may not end up on opposite sides of this conflict.”

“Haven't we already?” Ulmo asked and Finrod shrugged.

“There are countless ways to fall,” he said. 

In other circumstances, Ulmo might have laughed. “No, there is not.”

Finrod's eyes flashed in the low light. “You used to argue with the Council,” he said. “So many times you insisted you knew as well or better than they did. And yet at the end of the day, you're still as narrow minded as they are. You think there is one dogma and you follow it as blindly as anyone else.”

“There is a line,” Ulmo said. 

“Between the light and the dark?” Finrod asked with a sardonic smile. 

Ulmo reached out, touching the edge of his hair, which was still so bright and golden. Finrod's face was still young and unlined, showing no marks of dark side corruption and it was almost enough to make Ulmo hope. Finrod snarled but did not draw back from his touch. “You can still come back.”

Finrod stared at him. “I am not going to be so melodramatic as to say it's too late for me,” Finrod said. “But nor do I have any intention of coming back to your fold.”

“I miss you,” Ulmo admitted, the words stark and it seemed like they echoed around them in the stone. For a moment Finrod stared at him.

“Attachment,” he said softly before reaching his hand out to cover Ulmo's eyes. “Is not the Jedi way. Sleep now.”

And somehow Ulmo felt himself rapidly falling under the compulsion. “Turgon,” he heard Finrod say as if from a great distance. “May be more willing to listen to you.”

-0-

If Finrod really had said that to him and it hadn't been a fever dream, than he had greatly misjudged Turgon from the last time they met. 

He had locked himself in a tower made of stone and the Force, allowing no one to enter or leave it. Ulmo only slipped in because of his old place in Turgon's life. 

“I should not let you leave,” was the first thing Turgon said to him. 

“You should not be here either,” Ulmo said, and Turgon was already turning away from him. “What is the point of locking yourself up in this cave? You have cut yourself off from the war, from everything. Why—”

“The Jedi and the Sith both have it wrong,” Turgon said and there was a slant to his shoulders that had not been there.

Ulmo ground his teeth. “It is not—” 

“This way,” Turgon said, and there was something wrong in his eyes. “I can survive both orders. The people I have here under my protection are safe and will weather both storms. We can create something new, out of the chaos of these wars.”

“There is no middle path!” Ulmo yelled because he had failed both of those boys he had pulled from the wreckage so long ago. They both had fallen, even if neither of them had become Sith. “I have tried to find it my whole life, listen to me one more time—” 

But Turgon was already turning away. At least he did not put Ulmo to sleep and send him away.

-0-

A handful of years later another boy looked up at him, eyes bright with unshed tears and bright hair. “Please,” he said and Ulmo swayed, barely staying on his feet. “I have no one else.”

“I cannot train you,” he said, forcing the words past his dry throat. 

“There is no one else,” the boy said. 

“I am not the master you seek,” Ulmo said because the years he had spent with Finrod and Turgon felt like ash in his mouth. 

“Please,” the boy said and Ulmo walked away.

-0-

Once again the Council looked down at him. “There is no one else to train Tuor,” Manwë said. 

“You said that to me once before,” Ulmo snapped, his hands folded in his robe sleeves to hide that they were shaking. “Both of those boys are gone now. I will take no other padawans.”

“Is that foresight or stubbornness?” Varda asked. 

“Both,” Ulmo replied and walked out of the chamber. 

-0-

The next time he saw Finrod, he woke up to find him leaning over him. He forced himself to lie still as Finrod cocked his head to the side. 

There were more lines on his face, but they looked like worry lines, not the lines of dark side corruption and Ulmo wished he would stop seeking hope in Finrod's beauty. “I shall not ask if you bothered to bribe the hotel owner or not.”

“No,” Finrod said and smiled. “It is not so difficult to find you.”

“I shall endeavor to make it more so in the future,” Ulmo said, and Finrod sighed, sitting down on the side of the bed, one arm still braced over Ulmo. 

“There isn't going to be much of a future,” he said. 

“Don't talk like that,” Ulmo said, because he had woken up too many nights to the sound of Finrod screaming from a Force dream. “The future is—”

“Always in motion,” Finrod said softly. “I know. But this,” and his fingers brushed some of his greying hair out of Ulmo's eyes. “This is not in motion. I will go because I promised. And I am not powerful enough for my task. I know this even as I know I will not turn away from it.” He laughed suddenly, bitter. “I could get lucky.”

“Finrod,” Ulmo said. “I have dreamed of Turgon's fall, not your own.”

“Don't you remember? We're already fallen.”

Ulmo's hand snapped out to grab Finrod's wrist and Finrod hissed when he held it too hard. “You don't have to walk to your own death.”

“I came to say goodbye, not to get a lecture on my visions,” Finrod said and Ulmo felt his heart clench. 

“The Force,” Ulmo said weakly.

Finrod laughed again and it was a totally different sound than it had once been. “I know, I know,” he said, yanking his hand back hard enough Ulmo let it go. He shook out his wrist, before focusing on Ulmo's face again. “I'm not afraid of death. I'm not even angry about it, and I've been angry about a great many things of late.” He made a face. “Including my dear cousins. They think that we don't notice how close they've inched to being Sith, as if there is no difference in one fall from another.”

This time Ulmo did not protest that there was no difference. 

“But that doesn't matter,” Finrod shook his head, dislodging his scowl. “No, I accept what is to come. I know the path I'm walking now and in some ways it's a relief.”

“I never pegged you for suicidal,” Ulmo said, blase to cover his fear and hurt. 

“I'm not,” Finrod whispered. “But I must do this and I will do it.” 

“Why did you come to say goodbye to me?” Ulmo asked and Finrod leaned down, giving Ulmo plenty of time to register he was leaning in for a kiss, and even more time to move away. 

Instead he let Finrod's mouth cover his, screwing his eyes shut. 

He could remember all the years together, all the times he watched Finrod grow and grumbled about finding him clothes that fit. He could remember the boy that trusted him with everything, and he could remember the adolescent who flirted like it was a weapon, and whose eyes were heavy when he looked at his Master. 

Ulmo had done a terrible job at ignoring it, as much as he tried. 

When he didn't pull back Finrod made a desperate sound against his mouth, his hands covering Ulmo's wrists and when Ulmo licked at the crease of his lips, he threw his leg over Ulmo's waist, covering him with his body. 

“Master,” he gasped and Ulmo shuddered all over, tugging his wrists free to wrap his arms around Finrod's neck instead. 

After that they didn't say a thing, beyond Ulmo's gasps and Finrod's high pitched whimpers he never allowed to turn into screams. 

When Finrod pulled away and started adjusting the clothing that Ulmo had never quite managed to rip off him entirely, Ulmo sat up, to better watch the movement of his muscles as he wrapped his sash back around his waist. 

“You do not have to do this,” he said again. 

Finrod looked back at him. “Perhaps not. But I will.” 

“You could still come home,” Ulmo said, something he had never called where they lived before. 

Finrod blinked at him, his shock obvious in the low light but he shook his head slightly. “Sorry,” he said. “I gave my word. I am at peace with whatever my fate is. I only wonder if you ever will be as well.”

“I have not been at peace with it since you fell,” Ulmo admitted and Finrod scooted forward on the bed against, resting their foreheads together.

“Finish your mission,” he said softly. “Do your duty. Keep going.”

“Why do you get to make demands of me but not listen to my own?” Ulmo asked, his eyes closing again.

“I have listened to your demands for a long time, Master” Finrod whispered. “Now you'll listen to one of mine.”

Ulmo had spent too long trying to unwind the threads of his attachment to this boy to ever think he would succeed. Not now, and especially not with Finrod's scent everywhere around him. “I love you,” he said, like it mattered anything at all and Finrod shuddered all over.

“Somehow,” he said, still a whisper. “I never doubted that, though I never thought I would actually have this.”

“When have I ever been able to deny you a thing?” Ulmo asked, his voice wrecked. 

Finrod's fingers stroked the back of his neck and he kissed him again, quick and light. “You have ever,” he started to say and could not finish, only shaking his head. “If the future is always in motion, if I survive, I'll come back. If not,” and he couldn't continue again.

“I'll find you in the living Force,” Ulmo said and Finrod choked on a laugh.

“I'm not sure that's how it works,” he said. 

“We become one with the Force,” Ulmo said, taking one of his hands and twining their fingers again. “Eventually I'll find you within it.”

Finrod's eyes closed again and he breathed. 

Ulmo thought he might have been forced to sleep again because when he woke up he couldn't remember exactly how Finrod left, even though he could still taste him in his mouth.

-0-

He was looking down at Tuor, whose eyes were too bright and eager for anyone's good when he felt it in the Force. 

Across the galaxy he felt the tug, the desperation from Finrod and the rage and intense love all twined together and thrown at him before it was snuffed out abruptly. 

“I will train you,” he said, using all his power not to stagger and fall over, not to scream or destroy all the glass in the courtyard.

“Do you really mean it?” Tuor asked.

“Yes,” Ulmo answered because it was the only path he could see in front of him anymore. 

“I won't fail you,” Tuor said with all the passion and certainty of youth and Ulmo wished he could smile or offer an assurance to the boy.

"I'm sure you won't," he whispered, and as Tuor looked on in confusion, sank to his knees. 


End file.
